For refugees last year was the deadliest yet. In 2017 we have the chance to act

In 2015 the refugee crisis exploded on the global scene. The year 2016 proved that it is not going away. Now 2017 presents a moment of choice.

Refugees featured prominently at the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos a year ago. After panel debates, simulations and virtual reality, participants were educated and empowered to make a difference. The tenor was very Davos: how to turn a challenge into an opportunity. As Christine Lagarde noted: “With appropriate policies – especially effective integration into the labour market – the potential from refugees can be harnessed for the benefit of all.” That same month 73,000 refugees arrived in Europe, but hopes were high that solutions could be found.

Instead, while 2016 saw refugee arrivals to Greece fall, across the Mediterranean it was the deadliest year on record; more than 5,000 people lost their lives, most en route to Italy. Globally, the number of refugees and internally displaced people reached 65 million for the first time, with 86% in developing countries without adequate resources to help them. More than half are not in camps but in cities, where understanding of their needs and how to meet them is weak.

And while the needs of refugees grow, so too has the backlash against these refugees and the Davos world view so hopeful of supporting them. Days before the UK voted to leave the EU, Nigel Farage unveiled his mendacious poster showing refugees crossing the border from Croatia to Slovenia, with the slogan: “Breaking point: the EU has failed us all.” A day after American-born Omar Mateen’s June attack on the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida, Donald Trump declared: “We have to stop the tremendous flow of Syrian refugees into the United States — we don’t know who they are, they have no documentation and we don’t know what they’re planning.” In fact the US has taken around 18,000 Syrian refugees since that war began, less than 0.4% of the total number of Syrian refugees globally, and it takes 18-24 months of security vetting for a refugee to get into the US.

The number of refugees looks set to grow while political and economic pressure on development budgets risks effective support for refugees being cut – resulting in stronger “push” factors for refugees. The far right is gaining confidence, with allies in the media, ahead of tight elections in France, Germany and the Netherlands. Refugees will continue to find themselves scapegoated, as political campaigns and economic strains intensify across Europe.

This year, 2017, must be the year in which solutions to the global refugee crisis are not only discussed but implemented. I offer four policy solutions:

The refugee crisis is both a consequence of a more interconnected world, and a cause of the revolt against globalization. It presents a policy challenge and a political challenge. The problem since the start of the Syrian conflict is that the policy has lagged behind the politics. The choice before us is quite simply stated: tackle the problems at source and hold our politics together, or leave the problems to fester, and illegal and underground flows of people will get around the highest walls.

The solution does require government leadership, but businesses and NGOs are going to need to innovate, and citizens mobilize. That is the argument I want to see being made in Davos this year.